Americans for the Arts

Rob Schultz

One of the tried-and-true methods for advocating government funding for arts education is to tell a story about the positive impact of the arts on an individual. If the story can convey transformative change in that individual, the more powerful the message will be.

Well, here is one story.

It may not be Hollywood blockbuster material, but perhaps some can relate.

Several decades ago, an individual was growing up in a 1960’s suburban, middle-class American neighborhood and living a relatively mundane and somewhat sheltered life.

Afflicted with what would today be diagnosed as ADHD, this individual had difficulty in school, especially high school.

Kathi R. Levin

Participation in and advocacy for the arts and arts education is a lifetime, persistent agenda that many of us believe is critical to living an educated, reflective, expressive, and complete life.

We are passionate people, often not afraid of sharing what matters to us. After all, the arts are about “making meaning.”

In that effort, sometimes we are so eager to share our beliefs that we fail to maximize the leverage that we might by encouraging learners – both adults and younger students – to articulate why the arts, participating in them as both artists and audience, are at the heart of what they have come to care about as an important part of their complete educational experience.

Thanks to the good work of Americans for the Arts, we actually have a great deal of the data we need about the economic impact of the arts and the 5.7 million jobs that are in place due to the arts.

Can you really make a living as an artist, or even as someone working behind the scenes in the governance and management of the arts and arts organizations?   

Rachel Evans

I wish I had counted how many people said to me over the last seven years that I need to teach the pre-service theatre educators in my classes to be arts education advocates.

On one hand, it’s exciting to realize that the field has progressed to the point that it recognizes advocacy as a necessary part of the student-teaching experience. On the other hand, crafting an identity as an advocate and adopting an advocacy agenda--that’s quite a bit of pressure on the young educator.

Or so I thought.

I chose to start small. The students in Kean University’s Topics in Theatre Education class began by reviewing advocacy sections on the websites of various service organizations.

We looked at the materials I saved from Arts Advocacy Day 2010 and we watched the video ad for 2011’s gathering.

I spoke as passionately as I could about the lasting effects last year’s AAD experience had on me: building my convictions and motivating me to find my own voice as an advocate for the arts.

Kim Dabbs

In my undergraduate training, I was given the opportunity to earn my degree in Studio Art History at Kendall College of Art and Design in Michigan. This program gave me a comprehensive art history background with a foundation in studio art.

As someone that didn't have the level of visual arts talent as my other art school peers, I struggled through my life drawing courses and endured harsh critiques in my three dimensional design classes.

But, at the end of the semester, I had a clearly noticeable difference in my skills in all of those foundation areas. My bodies looked like more like bodies and my sculptures became more balanced while I was finding my creative voice.

It wasn't the self-discovery that I credit my studio foundation with but the discovery of the world around me. While I was learning about our culture and the cultures of others through the frame of visual art, I was also learning to see the entire world in a whole new way by participating in the art making process.    

Marete Wester

When it comes to advocating for arts education, I think we are in the “best of the best”—and the “worst of the worst”—of times.

I’ll start with the "worst of the worst."

The political environment for education is more hostile and corrosive than ever before.

The economy has not rebounded enough to help stave off what the loss of federal education funds to the states through the 2010 stimulus package will mean to local districts. Loss of teachers and programs are not just happening in the arts—they will happen system and subject-wide.

One recent example is the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate passed a Continuing Resolution (CR) to provide funds for FY 2011 (current year) for two weeks to avoid a federal government shutdown. The two weeks is up on Friday.

The CR actually makes a $4 billion cut in domestic spending, including a number of federal education programs—such as Teach for America.  Not surprisingly, among these programs designated for cuts is the $40 million Arts in Education program for which we advocate every year.

Richard Kessler

When the categorical funding line for arts education in the New York City Public Schools was eliminated, essentially to "empower the principals" and to increase the total budget available to each school, a good friend and colleague of mine who works for the local district said: "money is policy."

Short and sweet - don't ya think?

And let's be clear here, we're not talking about soft money, which tends to be relatively small and short-term.

We're talking about good old fashioned tax levy money, real-deal school dollars. The kind that is in increasingly short supply

There are many who will take issue with this. The arguments against this statement center on money not necessarily changing anything for the long haul, and in the absence of more thoughtful structures that give context and meaning to the funding, the long-term intentions behind the change brought about by funding tend to be evanescent.